


Hush, darling...I've got you...

by MovesLikeBucky



Category: Good Omens (TV)
Genre: Aziraphale Comforts Crowley (Good Omens), Aziraphale Loves Crowley (Good Omens), Crowley Has Nightmares (Good Omens), Established Relationship, Fluff and Angst, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mostly Fluff, Nightmares, Scene: The Bookshop Fire (Good Omens)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-23
Updated: 2020-05-23
Packaged: 2021-03-03 06:08:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,729
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24330070
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MovesLikeBucky/pseuds/MovesLikeBucky
Summary: “Crowley!” Aziraphale says a third time, a shout of panic that doesn’t come from Aziraphale’s mouth.  Crowley’s eyes snap open.“Crowley, please wake up and come down, please!”  Aziraphale’s voice is panicked as he stands in the center of their mattress, here in the flat above the bookshop.  Crowley is flush against the ceiling, and Aziraphale is pulling at the hem of his shirt trying to wake him up, barely able to reach.
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 76
Kudos: 377





	Hush, darling...I've got you...

**Author's Note:**

  * For [CCs_World](https://archiveofourown.org/users/CCs_World/gifts).



> Hello everyone! I have some hurt/comfort for you all this evening, based on [this amazing and beautiful artwork](https://morosexual-aziraphale.tumblr.com/post/618867182239088640/just-some-sad-post-nightmare-snuggles) by CCs_World that was shared in the DIWS MiniBang server! I couldn't help myself, I hope you enjoy it CC!! <3 <3

Flames, thick and orange, lick through linen and cotton rag and parchment. They creep up the shelving, caress the quickly bowing rafters, melt the leather of the sofa. Freddy’s voice creeps, distorted and ugly through the gramophone as the vinyl warps. His dear Bentley, trying in vain to keep his spirits up. She’s such a good car.

“Aziraphale!” Crowley screams as he runs through the fire. It flicks out at his clothes, sears his skin with a cold heat. “For Go— for Sa — for  _ somebody’s sake _ where are you!?”

He hears the shattering of the front window, feels the jet of water from the firehose strike him in the chest. It knocks the wind out of him, the light and the sun, too. Smashes what little hope he had right out of his chest. He gathers himself best he can, tears streaming down his face. “You’ve gone…” he says, voice small and quiet.

The anger bubbles inside of him: at Heaven, at Hell, at everything in between. He feels it rising, Hellfire in his veins. He screeches, an unholy sound, infused with his own demonic essence. No one could mistake it for a human scream. “Bastards! All of you!!” He screams to the ceiling, to anyone stupid enough to be listening; to Her.

A book lies on the ground in front of him, charred and singed but still recognizable. The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch. He picks it up, looks around him. The paper and parchment serve better than any dry kindling could, burning to ash around him. Everything Aziraphale loved, everything he ever worked for, turns to ashes around Crowley.

He struggles to his feet; Aziraphale wouldn’t want him to die with the bookshop, though that is all that Crowley wants to do. Lie on the floor and let the flames take him. Mingle his atoms in the air with those of the Wildes and the Shakespeares; the snuffboxes and the stupid mugs with wings on them. Let him for the last bit of his existence be a part of something Aziraphale loved, just this once.

He puts his glasses back on, pointless really. Half of one lens is gone, the frame itself is melted. The glasses are a security blanket; a barrier he keeps between him and the world when he can’t handle it. He really can’t handle it now.

The doors fling open because he expects them to and he stalks out, book in hand, fully intending to find the nearest bar and drown in scotch until the world goes tits up.

“Oh this is hilarious,” he hears a smug voice say to his left. “Look at this! The demon is actually  _ crying _ . How pathetic.”

He turns on his heel, ready to fight, and sees Gabriel, flanked as always by his gaggle of archangels.

“You!” Crowley shouts, pointing an accusatory finger, fangs coming into existence and scales chasing up the sides of his neck. “You did this! You killed him!”

“Me? Please. What reason would I have to kill a Principality.” Gabriel says with a grin that doesn’t reach his eyes. It never does, it never has. From what little Crowley can recall of Heaven, he remembers that he had never once in his existence trusted a word Gabriel said.

“He’s gone! And you’re here, and that tells me all I need to know! You killed my best friend!”

“Best friend?” A familiar voice from behind him sends a shock through his spine. “You really have gotten delusional, haven’t you dear boy?”

There, not a scratch on him, stands Aziraphale: still stuffy looking as ever, his usual human garb traded out for the bright beige and white of heavenly attire, and a look on his face that Crowley can’t properly place and doesn’t care to. 

Crowley rushes to him, not even contemplating the words he’d heard, purely ecstatic that Aziraphale is  _ here _ and not  _ gone.  _ “Aziraphale! You’re alive, you’re here!” He throws his arms around him, letting his tears flow freely. 

A lightning shock runs through his body. Holy energy, not enough to smite, but enough to burn. “Unhand me, foul fiend. What on earth do you think you’re doing?”

“Aziraphale? What is it?”

“Oh, oh I see.” Aziraphale nods with a smile that doesn’t reach his eyes. He’s never seen Aziraphale like this - cold and callous, eyes like a summer storm. “You actually thought we were friends?”

“But…but…” Crowley stammers as the archangels laugh amongst themselves. “All that time, everything we’ve done…we’re trying to stop the bloody Apocalypse, Aziraphale!”

“Oh were we? I rather thought I was thwarting you. Keeping an eye on you. Doing what I do best,” Aziraphale says, smile dropping. “Keeping a needy demon in line.”

“Wha…what…” Crowley grasps around for any kind of explanation; finding none that make sense, he goes with the only thing that might. “Angel, they’ve got you brainwashed, must do. You wouldn’t say this, not to me. I love you, Aziraphale, you have to know! You can sense it!”

“Convenient that,” Aziraphale says, stepping in close. It’s not the same kind of close that has accompanied him in the past. This is a threat, carried with a promise. “A needy demon, starved of love, attaches himself to the first angel he sees. A real victory for us. Access to everything we’d ever need to know about Hell, couched in a smile and false love.”

“False— Wha—“ His head is spinning, moreso than it did when he fell. The bookshop burns beside them, structure collapsing in onto itself. Weren’t there firefighters here before? Won’t it end up spreading? Where did everyone go? “Aziraphale,” Crowley grabs onto Aziraphale’s lapels, willing him to understand, “Aziraphale how can you say that? There’s nothing false about how I feel for you.”

Aziraphale brushes his hands away, disgust painting his features. “As though a demon could ever be capable of love.” 

Aziraphale walks past him, joining the group of laughing archangels. Crowley sinks to his knees right there on the pavement; smoke stinging his eyes almost as much as the tears.

“Well, that was  _ extremely  _ entertaining, Aziraphale, well worth the wait,” Gabriel says around his laughter. “A demon in love with an angel, have you ever heard something so stupid.”

“Not in my entire 6000 years on earth, my old friend,” Aziraphale says as Crowley searches his face. Searches for any sign that this is a trick, something that Aziraphale needs rescuing from, something that’s not  _ him _ . 

“Crowley,” Aziraphale says, just his name, but the ire and panic in it make Crowley’s tears flow freely.

“Crowley,” he says again, and Crowley wants to melt into the pavement, sink back to hell, let them destroy him for his mistakes.

“Crowley!” Aziraphale says a third time, a shout of panic that doesn’t come from Aziraphale’s mouth. Crowley’s eyes snap open.

“Crowley, please wake up and come down, please!” Aziraphale’s voice is panicked as he stands in the center of their mattress, here in the flat above the bookshop. Crowley is flush against the ceiling, and Aziraphale is pulling at the hem of his shirt trying to wake him up, barely able to reach.

“‘Ziraphale,” Crowley chokes out around a sob and falls from the ceiling into his husband’s waiting arms, tears flowing freely and soaking into Aziraphale’s pajama top. They sink back down onto the mattress, Crowley clinging to his angel as tightly as he can.

“It’s ok, dearest, I’ve got you, you’re safe, you’re here,” Aziraphale coos into his ear as he runs a soothing hand through Crowley’s sweat drenched hair. The other traces up and down his spine, grounding him back into reality. 

“It’s alright, darling, let it out,” Aziraphale whispers softly. “No use bottling it up, you can talk when you’re ready.” He places a gentle kiss into Crowley’s hair, and from that point of contact Crowley can feel Aziraphale’s love wash over him. Slowly, like sinking into a pleasantly warm bath after a long day. It sinks into his bones, into his atoms, calming him from the inside out. 

Crowley nuzzles closer, not able to stop crying just yet. Aziraphale just holds him, whispers I-love-you’s and I’m-here’s, lets him cry it out like he needs to. It’s so different now, the ability to wear these emotions. To trust they won’t get turned against you. Crowley still struggles with this sometimes, but he’s trying to do better. To be more present, to not bottle things up.

They stay like this for several minutes, holding onto one another. Crowley knows Aziraphale needs this as much as he does; this comfort and contact. Here, in the darkness of their shared bedroom, they hold one another as close as they can. Something they wouldn’t have dared even a decade ago. 

Crowley’s sobs slow, turning to soft hiccoughs as he pulls away to look Aziraphale in the eyes, needing to see what’s there. The moonlight through the window is all the light they have, but Crowley can see clear as day. Bright hazel eyes full of love and concern, gazing at him so softly that it makes his blackened heart ache. This is his angel, the one in the dream never existed.

Two soft and strong hands cup Crowley’s cheeks; soft lips press kisses to his forehead, his chin, the tip of his nose. He lets out a deep sigh he hadn’t realized he needed, relief washing over him in one final burst as he leans their foreheads together. Aziraphale’s thumbs ghost over his cheekbones, infinitely gentle and infinitely welcoming before the angel kisses him softly.

“Do you want to talk about it, darling?” Aziraphale asks as Crowley’s hands find their resting place on his sides, the softness under his palms grounding him further. “Was it the bookshop again?”

It’s an old retread path, nightmares of that day. Aziraphale knows him, inside and out. Knows the cycle of his nightmares. The bookshop, the bandstand, the trials. He can usually guess, based on whatever Crowley had babbled in his sleep. 

“Bookshop, yea,” Crowley says, nodding. Aziraphale kisses him softly again, brushing sweaty hair from his forehead with an infinitely tender touch. “Wank wings were there. Said you hated me.” He feels the tears threaten to come back as Aziraphale pulls him close once again.

“Oh, my dearest, never,” Aziraphale says, holding him tight. “I could never hate you, never in all of time. You’re the most treasured love of my life, darling. I’m not going anywhere, especially anywhere those bastards might be.”

Aziraphale leans them back into the pillows, cradling Crowley close to him, peppering his forehead and cheeks with kisses. 

“Promise, angel?” Crowley can’t stop himself from asking. The words feel weak and tiny as they escape his mouth. Hadn’t Aziraphale promised already? There in Tadfield among their friends as they promised each other eternity? 

Aziraphale doesn’t let him feel bad about it for long. “Of course, dearest, I’ll promise a million times if you need to hear it,” Aziraphale says, kissing him again. There’s never a judgment here. Aziraphale knows, maybe better than anyone, how much that reassurance means. He plants kisses all over Crowley’s face, muttering an ‘I promise’ between each one, filling Crowley’s heart to bursting.

“Tell me, angel,” Crowley says as he settles against Aziraphale’s chest, wrapped in these strong arms he adores. He’s feeling a bit bold, a bit brave; and sometimes in love, there are things you just need to hear. “Tell me all the ways you’ve loved me.”

Aziraphale smiles at him, brighter than the moonlight. “Of course, darling.” From where Crowley rests his head, he can feel Aziraphale’s heartbeat. They don’t need them, but Aziraphale knows it comforts him, and so he keeps it. A small thing, to be sure, but it means more than Crowley could ever put into words.

“ _ All _ the ways, dearest?” Aziraphale asks. Crowley nods and nuzzles even closer, earning him a laugh. “We’ll be here quite a while then.”

“Good, never wanna leave,” Crowley says with the air of a petulant toddler. He would do it, he thinks. Stay here wrapped in Aziraphale until the sun burns out. Seems a good way to spend the millennia, after how much time they lost.

“Silly old serpent.” Aziraphale laughs as he kisses the top of Crowley’s head, running a gentle hand down the length of his serpentine spine. “You are the only one who’s always been here, who’s always accepted me. Who’s loved me without there being conditions.

“Heaven never loved me.” Aziraphale kisses the top of his head, lips lingering there for a moment so he can whisper. “Not in the real sense, you know that. Means to an end, blind obedience — that’s all they cared about. You saw  _ me _ . The real me. And no matter how much I ever doubted myself, you loved me and accepted me anyway. That alone would be reason enough for me to love you for the rest of my existence.

“But it’s so much more than that, my darling, so much more.” Aziraphale’s words are spoken softly, like a secret to be kept between them, to be written onto Crowley’s heart, scrawled onto the pages of his being. “You are kind — don’t you groan at me, dearest, you know that you are — and you’re a better demon for it. You give people a choice to do good or evil, it’s really the most brilliant thing I’ve ever seen. You’ve been doing that since the beginning, giving people choices.

“I love everything about our life now, you know.” Lips ghost over Crowley’s forehead, words spoken softly against his skin. “I love when you cook breakfast; I love when you burn it and we end up with takeaway instead. I love being able to drink wine with you in the back when we close up for the day, whatever time of day that ends up being. I love falling asleep, here with you in my arms, your head on my chest. Where I know I can keep you safe.”

Aziraphale leans down, nuzzles their noses together and kisses Crowley, soft and slow. “I love you, Crowley, so very very much.”

“I love you, too, angel.” Crowley kisses him again, a soft brush of lips turning to something deeper and more desperate. Crowley wants to pour all of the love in his heart directly into Aziraphale’s so he knows, without a doubt, how much of himself is consumed with the angel. 

“It would take all of the forces of Heaven and Hell to drag me away from you,” Aziraphale says, breaking off and gently caressing Crowley’s cheek. “A few archangels with some ill-timed words could never. They never cared about me,  _ you _ did.  _ You _ do. And I love you more and more every day. Let them try to separate us; there isn’t a thing in this or any life they could do.”

Crowley wants to cry again, but not out of fear or sadness. In all his millennia on Earth, he never thought he’d have this. That he’d be in this bed with Aziraphale, that they’d be at this point. He had hoped, so often over the centuries. In the 5 th century, in Paris, in 1967. Reaching out as gingerly as he could, sometimes getting closer and sometimes getting pushed away.

He lies in his angel’s arms and thinks that really, for this, it was all worth it. Every second spent apart was worth every moment they get to have together now. All of the pain and hurt and uncertainty washes away from him here in his husband’s arms. 

“Thank you, Aziraphale.” Crowley is quickly growing drowsy again, sleep being his major vice just as much as food is Aziraphale’s. “‘M gonna try to sleep some more, I think.”

“Always, my dearest.” Aziraphale kisses his forehead, soft and slow. “May you dream of whatever you like best.”

“Urgh,” Crowley groans, “angel, don’t  _ bless _ me, you know it makes me itchy.” It’s got no bite; he’s already well on his way to sleep, drifting down into a much more pleasant dream. Full of love and life and this silly thing called  _ home _ he never thought he’d have.

“Goodnight, Crowley,” he hears Aziraphale whisper before sleep takes him. He dreams now of a garden and an apple tree. Of the day that changed both of their lives forever, of a day he will never, ever forget.

  
  



End file.
